An article was published yesterday by the New York Times to raise concern over potential of smartwatches to cause cancer. The article had a headline: “Could wearable computers be as harmful as cigarettes?” But it was soon changed by the editors to make it sound less exaggerated, but the article itself spoke a lot about the risk of cancer from the radiation emitted by the smartphones and smartwatches.

Many science journalists were left in rage by the article for it being based on debunked studies and deriving conclusions from the work of a doctor generally regarded as a quack.
Nick Bilton, a technology writer for the Times, claimed through his article that upcoming Apple Watch carries the risk of causing cancer. Bilton’s article talked about studies that long suspected that low levels of radiation from the smartwatch could cause brain tumors, cancer, disturbed blood rhythms and other health problems when held too close to the body for prolonged periods. But companies like Apple and Samsung have set the tone in the market to encourage people to buy gadgets that are required to be attached to our bodies all day long.

Soon after article was published, seven media outlets, most of them science-oriented publications, started scathingly criticizing it. For example, The Verge said that Blinton’s article was based on results of one of the studies, conducted by the International Agency for Research on Cancer to claim cell phones are possibly carcinogenic to humans, was not a study at all.

“What struck me about this article was that Bilton went to exactly the worst of the studies. If you read the best overviews by the most competent people, you’d come away saying that there’s no consistent signal that cell phones are causing brain cancer”, said Geoffrey Kabat, a professor of epidemiology at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine.